Bermuda captain Delray Rawlins is not fixated on Canada, their opponents in the opening match of the ICC Men's T20 World Cup Americas Regional Qualifier at White Hill Field this morning.

If the ICC rankings are used to be used to predict the outcome of this showdown, Canada are the favourites to come out on top. The Canadians are ranked nineteenth while Bermuda are farther down in 32nd place.

Canada arrived on the island from a camp in the United States a day earlier than Cayman Islands and Panama, which meant they got an extra training session on Thursday. All teams got to fine-tune for the last time yesterday before the action commences today.

Rawlins acknowledged that facing Canada is a tricky assignment but the captain is fearless, knowing well how T20 cricket presents every team with a chance to succeed.

“We kick the tournament off with probably the toughest test,’’ Rawlins said. “I’m not one who really dwells on other teams and what they have and who they have. If we do what we have to do as a team, execute our skills and our plans, then I have no doubts we’ll come out on top.

“I'm not worried at all. I always feel T20 anyone can win, all it takes is someone to have a good day out. We have a lot of players in our team who have the capabilities of going out to get big runs or going through teams. We’re at home and we know our conditions really well.

“They [Canada] have a few guys who've been here before but it’s always one of those things, you have to adapt and you have to adjust.

“Them coming here earlier — they came in a day earlier than the other teams — I don't know how much preparation they’ve had on our wickets, but they had two days at training. I still feel we played a whole summer on these two wickets, and we’re in the right space to come out on top.”

“For me, I was actually quite happy to play them first up. We've done a lot in the last month, having the BPL and having two weeks of good training leading right into this.”

Knowledge of the conditions is not all that Niraj Odedra’s side are counting on for this tournament.

“We’re not so much banking on home conditions, he said.

“We just got to be real, it’s the reality of playing in Bermuda, it’s something that we should know and be definitely used to.

“The guys have been doing well all summer. If you look at the leaderboard for most runs in T20, we have six out of the top seven — it’s a positive to see that. We can’t really dwell on conditions too much because we all know what to expect.

“We've been working towards this probably for about a year now. There’s been a lot talk about it obviously among us as players and also the staff at the board as well.

“A lot of hard work’s gone into it from their part. We've also put in a lot of hard work as players, played a lot of practice games and obviously we know the positive of playing cricket the whole summer.

“Everyone’s looking forward to it, the preparation’s been good, it’s been thorough, it’s been precise, we’re looking forward to it.”

Bermuda have never been to a T20 World Cup and the existing crop of players have been presented with a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to write their names in the island’s history books.

“Obviously, it would be special to go to the World Cup,” Rawlins said.

“It’s a chance to put our names into history. For me it’s a feeling that we can’t describe for now.

“We’ll have to wait to see and get there, but the thought is that it will be the greatest achievement for all of us in any sort of cricket sense.

“Everyone knows what’s at stake, everyone’s on the same page, everyone’s working hard together. I think we’re in a really good place to qualify.

“You’ll see some exciting cricket from us; it’ll be a very special tournament from us.”

The captain made a plea to the fans to give the players the extra motivation they need to qualify for the World Cup.

“Get behind us,” Rawlins said. “This is the biggest thing that’s happened in Bermuda cricket in a long time.

“With the opportunity that’s at stake, if we qualify we can take them as well to get behind us. I really and truly feel things have been put in place for a reason — us winning the bid to have it here, it all makes sense.

“We as the players want them to get behind us so we can get that big push and qualify in front of our home fans.”